synchro.net/synchro.net.tar/synchro.net/modem.madness/SMMNETML/TIMB8.ZIP/WHATSNEW.B8

Text File | 1993-02-25 | 22.5 KB | 509 lines

New in beta 8:
--------------


■  Zonegating. There's a keyword for that:

   ZoneGate <yes | no | ask>

   It works as one would expect: when this is set to 'No' timEd won't do
   any zonegating, if it is set to 'Yes' it will zonegate any inter-zone
   messages, and if it is set to 'Ask', timEd will ask if it should
   zonegate or not..
   If you use Binkley with Squish, you can also let Squish handle it
   (that's what I do).

■  You can now press <right arrow> when in L)ist mode to go to a message
   (same effect as <enter>).

■  Fidouser.lst will be searched first now, before V7/FD. This way, you
   could use it as a 'shortlist' with only a few important names in it (if
   V7/FD lookups aren't fast on your machine).

■  New keyword: Kill_Original. This controls if you want timEd to delete
   a message, after you wrote a reply to it. (This is only functional in
   the netmail area). You can use this to keep your netmail area clean.
   The value can (again) be 'Yes', 'No' or 'Ask'.

■  When writing a CC: message, timEd will now mark all CC:'s as
   kill/sent (it will not do that to the original, of course).

■  TimEd will now put new kludges on a message that is C)hanged, to
   (possibly) reflect changes made to the message (like selecting a new
   origination address, the MSGID needs to be updated then).

■  If you try to C)hange a message that is already 'sent' or 'scanned',
   timEd will give a warning.

■  Turbo-charged some screen writing routines with inline assembler.

■  Tried to fix a bug with zero-length *.MSG messages (again..)

■  Support for FSC-35 'Replyto' and 'ReplyAddr' kludges. This is used
   for netmail replies.
   If you read gated Use/Internet messages that have this kludge
   (Fredgate can generate them), this will automatically address the
   netmail reply to your UUCP gate and put a TO: line at the top of your
   message.

■  Support for the 'Direct' message attribute. Very 'kludgey', 'cause
   Squish nor the MSGAPI directly support it.
   For Binkley-users (where Squish packs the netmail) one must set both
   'Crash' and 'Hold' to get the desired effect.

   But when I tested it, FrontDoor didn't seem to like that at all (put
   it on hold, I think). So... for FD users timEd will add a 'FLAGS DIR'
   kludge, that should work (with FD, that is, Squish/Bink won't work
   well if you do it like that).

   How does timEd know what system you run? It looks in your Squish.cfg,
   if it finds 'Arcmailattach', you are running FD, otherwise Binkley.
   If, for some reason, timEd doesn't read a Squish.cfg, you can force
   'Arcmailattach' by putting:

   ArcMailAttach Yes

   in timEd.cfg. (Default is *not* ArcMailAttach).

   Yuck!

■  For Use/Internet areas (or better: newsgroups :) the L)ist display
   was far from optimal: every message there has 'All' in the TO: field
   (put there by the UUCP <-> Fido gate).
   TimEd now has two L)ist modes, a 'normal' one, and a 'broad subject
   line' one (you get it with Alt-B). The latter has (as one would
   expect) a much broader Subject displayed, the TO: field is entirely
   zapped in that mode.
   While in the L)ist mode, one can switch bettween the two style with
   ALT-S (from S)witch..)

■  Added a direct way to print a message (hard copy to the printer). Key
   to use is ALT-P or P. It works from both the Message reading screen
   and the L)ist mode.
   The message(s) will be written to the device that was configured in
   timEd.cfg using the (new) PRINTER keyword. Examples:
   Printer PRN
   Printer LPT2

   If no Printer keyword was found in timEd.cfg, timEd will default to
   PRN.

■  When entering a file-request message, timEd will now ask you if you
   want to edit a body. If you answer with N)o a blank message will be
   generated. For file-requests, this is often the best thing to do (as
   blank messages are usually immediately killed on the destination
   system).
   The SysOps of the system(s) you are file requesting from will love
   you for it (I *hate* one line messages that only say 'thanks!' or
   'automatic file request').

■  TimEd will not show '** Empty Message **' anymore. Some people seemed
   to have strong feelings about it :)

■  When generating a reply to a message in another area (usually a
   'netmail reply'), timEd will add a note on top of the message
   indicating the area the message came from (Note: this is a reply to a
   message in XXXX).

■  Slightly changed MSGID parsing, to allow 
MSGID fidonet#2:281/527 123456
   style kludges (hmmm..) to be interpreted correctly.

■  When using ALT-M (message reading screen) or ALT-C / ALT-M (List
   mode) you can now abort this action from the area selection screen by
   pressing <ESC>. (So <ESC> doesn't clear the 'speedsearch' string
   anymore, but you can just as easily press a cursor key...).

■  Changed header editing, the 'triggering' of a nodelist lookup to be
   exact. TimEd would *always* do a nodelist lookup (in the netmail
   area) when you pressed <ENTER> in the TO: name field, also on replies
   and such, when an address was already present.

   It is now somewhat complicated :-) When pressing <ENTER> on the TO:
   name field, timEd will do a nodelist lookup on the name entered in
   the TO: field, when...

   - no address is already present in the TO: address field (on a new
     message for example).
   - you changed the TO: name field just before (when changing a
     message, for example).
   - you pressed F2 on this TO: field (remember, if you just changed
     the TO: field, just press <ENTER> and timEd will do a lookup. So
     only use F2 to lookup a *not* changed TO: field).

   When an address is already present, and no changes were made to the
   TO: name field, timEd will only look up the address already present.
   If it isn't present in the nodelist, it'll display the 'unknown
   address' message.

   Confused? Well, then forget all about it. I think (hope) it just works
   like most people want it to. And to force a lookup, press F2. Simple,
   eh?

■  Support for Orphan and Update Request attributes.

■  Changed the routines that read the configuration. Parsing large
   areas.bbs and/or Squish.cfg files should be somewhat faster now.

■  Added 'AKA matching'. This is useful if you have more than one
   address. Up till now, you had to select the most appropriate address
   manually.
   If you have two addresses (say 2:281/537 and 60:100/112) and you
   write a message to 2:281/5, you would probably want to use your
   2:281/527 address.
   When writing a message to 60:100/1, however, you'd want to use your
   60:100/112 address.
   TimEd will now try to match it for you. It'll first match zones, and
   if more than one match is found, it'll try to match nets as well. If
   it still comes up with more than one match, it'll just take the first
   one.
   If timEd selects an address different from the address that was
   currently used (so if anything changed), it will say so ("AKA
   matched") just below the addresses on the screen.
   Again, if you want to force it at a certain moment, press F2 when on
   the TO: address field.
   TimEd will stop matching the AKA's, as soon as you changed your
   address manually. So if you don't agree with timEd's AKA matching in
   a certain situation, just manually change it (while editing the
   header, so cursor up to the from: address field) to what you want it
   to be, and timEd will leave it with that (timEd is actually quite
   shy, if it sees that you don't agree, he'll leave it to you).

   All this is activated if you put 'AKAmatching Yes' in timed.cfg.

   Confused? Well, then forget all about it. I think (hope) it just works
   like most people want it to. And to force a match, press F2. Simple,
   eh?

■  Added 'search highlight'. When using the F)ind feature, timEd will
   display the lines that contain any of the search keywords in a
   different colour. The colour used is color_msgspecial (yep, the one
   that is also used for the to: field in personal msgs).

■  It is now possible to set the Squish style Max/Keep/Days parameters
   from within timEd. This is comparable to what you can do with
   SQset.exe (that comes with the Squish package). From the message info
   screen (ALT-I) press C to change to your heart's content.
   This doesn't work for *.MSG areas (of course..).

■  Optimised the scanning speed for the '+' function (go to next area
   with new mail). It also shows (on the 'statusbar' on the bottom of
   the screen) what area it is currently scanning.
   I also added '-' in the process (find previous area with new mail).

■  Changed the way <page down> works in the message reading screen. At
   the end of the message, timEd would not 'scroll down' an entire
   'page' if there weren't that many unseen lines left, but only a few
   lines, so that the screen would still be entirely filled (last line
   of the message == last line on the screen.) Ugh, bad explanation.

   Anyway, people would loose track of where they were reading. It's
   changed now, and those who didn't like it will know what I'm talking
   about. (This is just a trick to make the whatnew file long, so you
   guys think I did an enormous effort again :)

■  Changed the locking in the MSGAPI a bit. With this new code I managed
   to write several messages to a message area that Squish was
   constantly tossing messages to. After this exercize the message area
   was still not corrupt. I'll let you guys do the real world testing.
   Maximus corrupted the area in this exercize, BTW. GoldED did just
   fine, and msged crashed my machine or locked up. Be sure to use a
   message area with a -$m limit set, sliding messages are lots of fun :)

   Locking is now only active if 1) share is detected (int 2F, sub
   1000h) , *and* 2) timEd sucessfully locked a file in the timEd
   directory (either current or the one specified by the -c command-line
   switch). WIN seems to always return 'True' for a share installation
   check (even without share loaded), but without share locking fails
   anyway. This made timEd quite confused. (Me too, btw).

   I do not know how networks behave, but if share detection or the
   locking test fails on your workstation, there will be *no locking*
   done by timEd (or the MSGAPI, actually).

   Anyone who knows more about this stuff is encouraged to share his
   wisdom with me :)

■  Added message base maintenance 'hooks'. You can get to them from the
   message reading screen by pressing U or ALT-U (Utils).

   For *.MSG the only option is to renumber. TimEd will start a
   batchfile called renum.bat, with one parameter: the message dir for
   this area (like: renum.bat c:\binkley\netmail). In this batchfile you
   can the call your favorite renumber program (maybe Bob Hartman's
   renum, I think the batch should then be "renum -R %1"), and maybe run
   other programs (like scanbld for Max sysops) or touch semaphores or
   whatever.

   For Squish areas, there are four choices: Pack, Re-Index, Fix and
   Inspect. This will call SQpack, SQreidx, SQfix and SQinfo
   respectively (with message area as parameter). See to it that these
   programs are in your path.
   The programs are *not* called with the extension .EXE, so you *could*
   place a file called (for example) sqpack.bat in your path instead,
   and call SQpack/386/DPMI instead :)

■  Added 'unreceive' feature. CTRL-U now turns off the 'received' bit. Be
   sure *not* to fool around with message anymore, but move the the next
   message (or out of the area, or whatever) immediately, or the
   'received' bit will be set again before you know it :)

■  The personal mailscan now doesn't skip received messages anymore (it
   still scans from the lastread pointer though). This way you can scan
   for mail in the morning (while you're practically still asleep), after
   breakfast (more or less awake, you already forgot who sent you mail)
   and when you get home from work (to finally reply to all those personal
   messages).

■  You can now enter a '@' in a header (for Usenet addresses).

■  When reading a message that was just found in a personal mailscan
   (ALT-P from the area selection screen) or using the F)ind feature, you
   now have practically all functions available to you.
   Apart from the functions that don't make sense at that time (like
   'enter a message', 'list' or 'Utils (ALT-U)), you can now do everything
   you can normally do (like R)eply, T)urbo Reply, W)rite to file, D)elete
   etc).

■  Added a 'file request' feature. When you press CTRL-F, timEd will try
   to find filenames in a message (usually seen in 'file announcement'
   messages for SDS etc).

   Unlike other message editors, timEd does not (even try to) support
   specific 'announcement programs' by recognizing their 'formats'. There
   are many programs out there, and modern ones even allow you to design
   your own format. I think it's a waste of (programming) effort and code
   (size/speed) to try and support them.

   It just looks for strings that look like filenames. This search is
   'extension driven': timEd simply looks for file extensions :) Currently
   recognized:

   char *exts[] = {"arj", "zip", "arc", "pak", "lzh", "sqz", "com", "exe",
                   "lha", "zoo", "txt", "sdn", "sda", "ans", "jpg", "gif",
                   "tar", "" };

   When you press ctrl-f, timEd will try to find those extensions in the
   message, and a list with all filenames will pop up on the right hand
   side of your screen. You can scroll through the list, select files with
   <enter> or <space>, select all with '+', unselect all with '-', accept
   the current selection with <ctrl-enter>. Just like with a file
   attach.

   Limited message scrolling is still available: press <ctrl-pgup> and
   <ctrl-pgdn> to move the message (in case you don't even recognize the
   filenames, and the descriptions are somewhere else in the message).

   In case timEd missed a filename, or if you simply want to add one that
   isn't listed in the message (like FILES), press <INS> and type the name
   of the file. It will be added to the list, already selected.

   If timEd can't find any files, it'll show a list with only "FILES" on
   it. You can also abuse this to just request FILES from someone that
   seems to have an interesting BBS (but is not announcing files in that
   message).

   When you press <ctrl-enter> to accept, timEd will take you to the area
   selection screen, where you can pick an appropriate (netmail) area.
   It'll then let you edit the message attributes (maybe add crash or
   anything), and after you press <enter> it'll write the file request
   message(s) for you (empty, we don't want to write senseless "automatic
   file request" messages).

■  <ESC> now works correctly when editing the 'hello strings' (<ESC> exits
   immediately, without saving the strings).
   In previous versions it would jump to the last entry after <ESC>, and
   would write out the strings anyway :)

■  Changed the 'reformatting' of messages when read back in from disk
   (after the user edited it).
   Lines starting with a space or one of the following:  - * , .
   wille *never* be 'appended' to the preceding line.

   This way lists (like the one you are reading right now :) will probably
   stay formatted, even if you don't put the ~~ tokens around it.

   I found that most people don't really understand the problems with
   formatting, resulting in messages that look terrible :-) This should
   help quite a bit.
   Using this method, some some hard returns may stay in, even some that
   should actually be stripped (I guess), but that's better than those
   awfully looking messages :-)

   Let's wait and see.

■  The temporary file timEd generates (to feed to the external editor) is
   now called timed.msg. Some editors didn't seem to like timed.$$$.

■  You can now also use a batchfile with the "editor" statement in
   timed.cfg. You could use this to startup your editor with extra
   options, or to call other programs before or after the editor
   (spell-checker maybe?).

■  I think this is enough for one beta. Lots of new opportunities to find
   bugs again :)


  ><-----------------------------------------------------------------><


New in beta 7:
--------------



■   Fixed bug that crashed B6 when doing a CC: (BTW: when I added
    support for other nodelists, it broke again..). So I hope it's
    fixed twice :-)

■   You can now use CTRL-H to only change the header of a message (so
    you won't be put in the editor after editing the header).

■   When you press '+' from the message reading screen, you will now be
    taken to the next area with new mail. If there isn't any 'next area
    with new mail', you will go to the Area selection screen.

■   Fixed the implementation of the '-c' command line switch.

■   Cleaned up the 'Move/Copy/Forward' function: SEEN-BY's, PATH's and
    VIA lines will be stripped.
    When using 'forward' a new header, origin and MSGID kludge will be
    created using your name and address. These changes should guarantee
    that the messages will be properly exported (and routed, if you send
    it via netmail).

■   Support for multiple lastread pointers. This is necessary if you
    are not the only one using timEd on 1 machine (as the lastread
    pointers would have to be shared then).
    Two keywords in timEd.cfg:

    Lastread <filename> : name of the lastread file for *.MSG areas.
                          The default is "lastread".

    Squish_Offset <number> : position of the lastread pointer in the
                             *.SQL file (for Squish areas). For the
                             first user this is 0 (which is the
                             default).
                             If you are the second user you should set
                             this to 1, if you're the third user you
                             should set it to 2, etc.

    If you are the only user on your machine (or you are the SysOp and/or
    first user) you don't need these.

■   New keyword: Ask_Confirmation <Yes/No>
    Used at two places right now: when deleting a message and when
    exiting timEd, it'll ask for a confirmation when this is set to Yes.

■   Added support for fidouser.lst. Keyword: FidoUser <path+name> of
    'fidouser.lst format' userfile.

■   Added support for the FrontDoor nodelist. Use the new keyword
    FDnodelist in timEd.cfg to give timEd the directory where you
    FrontDoor nodelist files are situated.
    I didn't have any official info om this nodelist format, so I had to
    guess about the internals.
    This support is experimental!!

■   TimEd will now keep on scanning the nodelist for more than one match
    for a certain key. TimEd will show a list with all matches and let
    you select one of them.
    This is implemented for all three supported formats.

    For Version 7 nodelists, Qnode (nodelist compiler) can leave
    duplicate sysop names in the index (this is useful for sysops that
    have more than one address, like HUBs, Hosts or multinode systems).

    For FrontDoor nodelists, duplicate sysop names are always preserved
    (by FDNC).

    When doing nodelist lookups for a CC: message, timEd will just take
    the first match found, instead of prompting you for every message.




  ><-----------------------------------------------------------------><


New in beta 6:
--------------


■  The 'speed search' now works a bit better: backspace works, and
   pressing a 'movement key' (like 'up' or 'down') now also clears the
   string.
   In addition, you can now press CTRL-L to find a next match for the
   string (this might come in handu if you have a conference called
   OS2.028 at the top of the list and one called OS2 at the bottom. At
   least if you want to go to OS2 :-)

■  TimEd will now spawn the editor with the full path and filename of
   the file to edit (this was only the filename).

■  If you define an origin that is too long, timEd will now chop it off
   at the right length.

■  TimEd would reformat the body of a changed message (ALT-C), even if
   the body had not been updated. Fixed.

■  Yet another colour keyword: color_msgspecial: the colour of the 'TO:'
   field for personal messages (message reading screen). Using this
   keyword you can 'highlight' your personal messages.

■  TimEd would leave spaces behind the closing bracket ')' on the origin
   line, causing 'grunged message detectors' to reject the messages :-(
   TimEd now checks for a valid and clean Origin line, cleaning or
   adding origin lines when necessary. It should be OK now...

■  Added better support for 'Aliases'. The 'Alias' keyword is now
   obsolete, but you can now put up to 10 NAME keywords in timEd.cfg.
   When you are in a message area, you can press CTRL-N to pick one of
   the names you defined. This will then be the default until you leave
   that area.

■  Added similar support for AKA's, now you can press CTRL-A to pick one
   of your Addresses.

■  Added the ability to change both the origination address and name
   while editing a header.
   When editing a header you will still start at the 'From:' field, but
   you can now press 'up' to go edit the origination address, and 'up'
   again to edit the orig-name.
   From both these fields, you can also press <TAB> to get a list of the
   defined NAMEs and AKAs, and pick the one you want. An address or name
   that is chosen using this method is valid for that message only (so
   it will not change the default like CTRL-A and CTRL-N do).

■  Added the WRITENAME keyword to config. Use this to give a default
   filename to write to (using ALT-W). If you don't use this it will
   still be timed.prn.
   Example: WRITENAME c:\timed\safe.out

■  TimEd now exits with useful errorlevels:

   No mail entered    :   0
   Netmail entered    :   1
   Echomail entered   :   2
   Local mail entered :   4
   If more than one type is entered the numbers are added:
   Net + Echo         :   3
   Net + Local        :   5
   Echo + Local       :   6
   Net + Echo + Local :   7

   Error: 254

■  Added the Startup_Scan keyword. You can use it to tell timEd if you
   want to scan the message areas at startup. It can have three
   different values:

   Yes      - scan all areas at startup
   No       - do not scan areas at startup (default)
   Personal - Do a personal mailscan at startup

   Example:

   Startup_Scan Personal